The Tony Elumelu Foundation (TEF) has awarded $5.57m to the 1.114 successful winners of the 2024 Entrepreneurship Programme after the number of applicants rose to a record 150,000 but the Founder and Chairman of the TEF, Tony Elumelu, wishes to increase the number of beneficiaries....CONTINUE READING
Each winner will get $5,000, Elumelu announced on Friday at the award event held in Lagos.
“Over 1,114 young women and men from 54 African countries will each receive a non-refundable $5,000 seed capital.
“We believe in spreading luck, we believe in democratising luck, we believe in spreading prosperity and we think that the easiest way in spreading prosperity in Africa is by identifying our young ones, encouraging them, and helping them to start their own business,” Elumelu said.
The Chairman and his wife, Awele Elumelu, started the foundation 10 years ago intending to improve the lives of young Africans by providing seed capital to fund their businesses.
In Africa, over 431 million people live in extreme poverty with 133 million people in Africa’s largest economy, Nigeria, living in multidimensional poverty according to Statista.
TEF has achieved incredible success as it has disbursed more than $100m to over 20,000 men and women from across Africa in support of the vision according to industry experts.
The $100m is disbursed from family fortunes according to the founder but in addition, the foundation has established partnerships with the European Union, Google and African Development Bank (AfDB), among others.
“We are happy with the results we are seeing now,” Elumelu said, adding, “We are happy to see our young ones progressing.
